[c-nsp] Can I use BGP instead of any IGP?

[Keegan Holley]

2012/5/30 Mark Tinka <mark.tinka at seacom.mu>

> On Wednesday, May 30, 2012 03:34:04 AM Andrew Jones wrote:
>
> > In enterprise WAN environments, you could use BGP as the
> > sole routing protocol, if you treat each individual site
> > as a separate AS (private AS numbers offcourse).
> >
> > Depending on the size / complexity of the campus, you
> > might still need an IGP within the campus. Again you
> > could treat each individual router as a separate AS,
> > forming ebgp peers across links where dynamic peers
> > would ordinarily appear.
>
> It didn't sound like this is what the OP was after; you're
> right, it would work but seems awfully complex :-).
>
> I think the OP was after replacing any IGP with BGP,
> including using BGP for BGP. The latter is easy, the former,
> not so much.
>

Maybe the name of the thread should be "Can/Should I use BGP without an
IGP", to which most would answer a clear and resounding no.  The original
title somehow implies that BGP can replace a normal IGP and it's topology
database or that it was designed to do so.  BGP as an IGP is technically
just as strange as BGP for name resolution.  Asking if you can use it
without an IGP is a little more accurate.